The Art of Solitude

I have learned that the value of meditation is not that it changes the content of your experience. It changes your relationship to that content. All the worries, egotistic fantasies, lusts, and pettiness that surge into consciousness are simply the result of previous conditions over which I have little control. They are naturalistic processes that happen independent of my volition. I do not choose to feel them. All I can do is be mindful of them as they arise, recognize them for what they are, and not let myself be too influenced or swept away by them.

When you start working,” said the composer John Cage, “everybody is in your studio—the past, your friends, enemies, the art world, and above all, your own ideas—all are there. But as you continue painting, they start leaving, one by one, and you are left completely alone. Then, if you are lucky, even you leave.”

The practice of Zen is about coming to terms with the question of who and what you are. Allow yourself to be a mystery for yourself rather than a set of more or less interesting facts

“Solitude is good for great minds but bad for small ones. It troubles brains that it does not illuminate.”

Most Buddhists, moreover, would regard taking peyote and ayahuasca as an infraction of the moral precept against intoxicants and thus incompatible with the practice of the dharma.